[lg policy] Googledigook

[Harold Schiffman]

Gene Weingarten: Googledigook


By Gene Weingarten, Published: December 31 | Updated: Thursday,
January 3, 8:00 AM

One of America’s best-run companies, it is said, is Google, which uses
the powerful telemetry of the masses — the feedback from a super-aware
hive mentality — to self-correct its product to near perfection. And
so I was merely trying to be helpful when I pointed out a year ago
here that “Google Voice,” the translation software for phone and
computer, needed a little work.

Google Voice listens to your voice mail, transcribes it and sends it
to you as e-mail. What I’d discovered was that it was imperfect.
Urgent messages I sent to my editor, Tom the Butcher, came in too
garbled to understand. (Example: “Tom, I’ve locked myself in the linen
closet, and I’m afraid I might asphyxiate” became “Tom, I lost my
cellphone in the linen closet, and I’m afraid I might add 58.”

Having thus officially alerted Google to its problem, I waited for its
vaunted self-correction system to kick in. A year passed. Tom recently
turned back on his Google Voice function to get this message from me:
“Ellis Senior Associate Pastor from the ocean.” The voice message I
had left: “I’ll explain the fallacy of your sociopathy notion.”

Sigh. Here are my new urgent messages to Tom and their translations.

***

“I have cut the brake cable in your Prius because I want to have your
wife all to myself. It was wrong, and I regret it. Don’t get in that
car.”

This became:

“Cut the briefcase came on your previous, so I wanna ask you wife all
to myself with long and I regret hello just crazy. We was that call.”

***

“Tom, in case the cops inquire, I was with you on Friday night from 8
p.m. to 11, so no WAY could I have been on a panty-stealing binge at
area laundromats. We were, uh, playing Parcheesi.”

This became:

“Tom, Yanachek the cops inquire. I work with you on Friday night from
8 AM to 11 from the way it could’ve been on the anti-feeling pitiful
laundromat. We were route playing Patrice.”

***

“I’ve learned exclusively that the POTUS is an evil cyborg made by
Google. I have to get this message out before ... Omigod, they’re here
for me! I’m a goner!”

This became:

“I’ve learned exclusively that the politics and people sign for made
by Google, I have to get this message out before home. I’ve got to
hear from a McDonough.”

***

“I was wrong when I said it was okay to feed your dog, Sally, a pound
of M&Ms, Milk Duds and Ho Hos. It turns out the chocolate’ll kill her,
so don’t do it.”

This became:

“I was wrong when I said was okay if you get those Sally account of
them and you the whole quote. It turns out the trouble to your. I
don’t do it.”

***

“Tom, I’m in a tattoo parlor about to get a belly tat. Either Honest
Abe Lincoln or Sarah Palin, naked. If I don’t hear from you I’m going
with Sarah.”

This became:

“Tom on the tattoo Pollard out to get a good weekend. Either. On. If
they want to know if you’re feeling make it. Yes, if I don’t hear from
you. I’m gonna say.”

***

Anyway, Google, I mostly like your company and hope that this time you
will hop to it and make the needed corrections to your system overall.

Or, as your vaunted Google Voice might translate: I mostly lick your
corpulence and hope that this time you will opt to hit and cake
denuded colo-rectal tires Istanbul.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/2012/12/21/9019dd36-4636-11e2-8e70-e1993528222d_story.html?wpisrc=emailtoafriend

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